Poll: Paypal sucks :C...Alternatives?

[Scappo]

Like the title says- I'm sure a lot of us have had problems with our evil Paypal overlords randomly freezing accounts and money, demanding we provide everything from our SSN's to our first born children in order to have the account reinstated. The company has fallen into the same trap that oh so many mega-corporations fall into when they get too large- Citizen Kane syndrome. They could give a care less about their customers, and eventually they're gonna piss /everyone/ off (especially come the end of the year when they start forcing people to demand Paypal income on their taxes.

So, which Paypal alternative do you use/recommend, and why? Also, anyone have any juicy horror stories about the not-quite-a-bank-but-we-wannabe company?

 

[Virgil]

I've found Amazon Payments to be the best alternative solution to PayPal, which is why we used them for PubClub. Amazon offered the best integration options, more features, and better pricing and availability than anyone else did at the time. Plus, they already have a ton of users and a good reputation for customer service.

Unfortunately, there doesn't appear to be a serious alternative to PayPal. Most sites don't accept any other payment alternatives (with the possible exception of direct billing), so as a user, I have to have a PayPal account. As a business, we weren't intending to use PayPal at all, but people pretty much demanded that we add it in because they weren't willing to use anything else.

 

[Griffolion]

I don't think Paypal is so bad, but if Google Checkout became more ubiquitous then I think I would switch to that as I quite like Googles integrated services.

Paypal really only has the advantage due to age and popularity. Like most other things, if another service innovates ahead of them and is more favourable in terms of commission charging then Paypal will lose their grip.

 

[dyre]

Paypal never gave me any problems :S

I don't actually have any money on the account, just a credit card attached to it, so I guess if they freeze my account, I'll just say fuck 'em. I can input my credit card info directly if need be.

 

[WarBossTilt]

Paypal never gave me any problems :S

I don't actually have any money on the account, just a credit card attached to it, so I guess if they freeze my account, I'll just say fuck 'em. I can input my credit card info directly if need be.

yeah im with this guy clearly only op has been having problems.

 

[Danzaivar]

paypal rocks face

 

[viranimus]

Well I had some degree of problem with Paypal this week actually when purchasing the humble bundle.

Seems Paypal didnt like it that I tried to use it via my Virtualized Linux Mint as opposed to the Windows OS I originated it from. Then it proceeded to run me through a security checkpoint asking me to reenter my credit card info of which it already had on file.

However... the trouble of it consisted of making one phonecall to their customer service number in order to manually bypass the webs auto check. So not even remotely a problem personally. (though they claimed there was a view of my account the day before, which I found odd, but not entirely unlikely.

Amazon payments would be my first choice over pay pal honestly. And for me google would be dead last because Google doesnt understand the meaning of the term "having their fingers in too many pots."

 

[antidonkey]

Been using paypal for years without issue. For a potential free alternative, check with your bank to use their bill pay service.